


What We Say

by grammarglamour



Category: Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Genre: M/M, sex during wartime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-15
Updated: 2010-09-15
Packaged: 2017-10-11 17:37:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/114925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grammarglamour/pseuds/grammarglamour
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Of course "Donnie" isn't his real name.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What We Say

Donny's pretty much an open book. If he doesn't like you, he'll let you know. He doesn't mind telling people that he went to beauty school and can do a cold finger-wave even better than Mabel Granella, who had been the head of the class when he was there. That's fine. But there are certain things he doesn't divulge to just anyone. His real name is one of those things.

Of course his first name isn't "Donny." That would be way too goyische for his parents.

Some people have to know. Aldo knows, because he read Donny's file when he was recruiting for the Basterds. They met up in a tiny London pub, the air inside thick with smoke, two pints and Donny's personnel file between them on a table tacky with a century's worth of spilled liquor.

"Okay –" He looked down at Donny's file, then squinted at Donny. "All right, what do I call you?"

"Call me Donny. Or just Donowitz."

"Donny or Donowitz it is," Aldo said. "Don't blame you none. Quite the moniker you got yourself, Sergeant."

"It was my grandfather's name. Suited him better than it did me."

"Ain't no name for a young man." Aldo took a drag of his cigarette. "I heard you did some damage down in Italy."

"Sure did, sir."

"You want to do some more damage?"

"As much as humanly possible, sir."

"I'm afraid I might hafta ask you for a little more than just humanly possible, Donny."

"I can do that too."

"Very good."

He laid out the plan for Donny then, clear as a new road map. Donny's stomach burned with anticipation, that same jumpiness he always got on the first night of Hanukkah as a kid, fighting with his cousins over the dreidel.

Before they parted ways with the agreement that Donny would report for duty the next day at the rendezvous spot, Aldo grasped one of Donny's hands in his own, clapping the other on his shoulder.

"If it makes you feel any better," he said, "my middle name is 'Llewellyn'."

"Not sure it makes me feel better, sir, but I appreciate your candor anyways."

Whether it was the strange bond shared only by those with unusual names, or the fact that Aldo understood Donny's artistic temperament in the ways of getting things done, neither could say. But they became a hell of a team and fast friends.

Each time a new guy comes on board, Aldo introduces Donny as Sergeant Donny Donowitz and leaves it at that. Donny is grateful for his sense of discretion.

The only one who ever questions it is Utivich.

"Donny Donowitz?" he asks one day.

They're stomping through the forest in the middle of a late summer rain, leaves already turning gold and falling to the ground, slick and adhering to their boots.

"Yeah?"

"Short for 'Donald'?"

"What's it to you?"

"Nothing, just you don't look like a Donald is all."

"Well, I'd say you don't look like a Smithson, but what the fuck does a Smithson look like?"

"Touchy," Utivich says.

"Oh, I'll touch you," Donny threatens. His fingers close around the handle of his bat, and he points it at Utivich.

"Promise?" Utivich smiles over his shoulder as he pushes ahead, starts talking to Ulmer.

Donny lowers his bat, but doesn't loosen his grip. The exchange leaves him feeling a slew of emotions, with "annoyance" leading the pack.

Two days later, and they're stopped for a spell at an old, bombed-out schoolhouse. The walls are still standing, but there's only half a roof, the rest of it having caved in, charred beams stabbed into the wooden floors.

Their system is, they go out in teams of two and keep watch for two hours. One team is done, they go in and wake the next one up.

Donny ends up with Utivich. He almost complains to Aldo about it, but decides not to, feels that he has a reputation to uphold with the Lieutenant as an unquestioning and capable right-hand man.

Utivich leans against a tree, smoking a cigarette, staring up at the stars.

The night is black, a kind of black that Donny never knew in the States. He'd barely been out of the city at all in his whole life, raised on the jagged bright of streetlights and movie theatre marquees and the buttery glow of kitchen lights spilling out of apartment windows.

"It's gonna get cold soon," Utivich says.

"Yeah."

"Sorry about the other day."

"Yeah."

"I still don't think your real name is Donny, but I shouldn't have pestered you about it. It's not really my business."

"Yeah, well, we're short on entertainment out here, so I guess we gotta do something."

Donny pulls out his own cigarettes, lights one, his eyes drawn to the silver plume of smoke curling up toward that impossibly black sky.

He looks at Utivich a little different after that. The other guys, they like Donny, they joke with him and everything, but he sees it in their eyes that they don't necessarily trust him. They don't want him too close, because they can see how much he enjoys his job. They can shoot guys and scalp them, but they can't do what Donny does, can't look them right in the eye and watch the bat connect with their faces.

Utivich, though, he sees it but he doesn't care. Donny catches him looking sometimes when they march, or if they are sitting across from each other. He has this look in his eyes like he's wondering what's under Donny's clothes.

So when they find themselves holed up in an abandoned farm house one night, the whole crew crammed into three rooms and a basement, Donny figures, hey why not.

They're in the basement. The air there is stagnant with the smell of moldy potatoes. Utivich stands by the window, looking out, the muzzle of his rifle poking through a broken pane of glass.

Donny comes up behind him, gets too close. He feels Utivich tense under him.

"Need something, Sergeant?" he asks.

Donny laughs, low in his throat. "You might say that." He lets his lips brush against the pale ridge of Utivich's ear.

Utivich lets out a small noise that might be a cough, and might also be the beginnings of suffocation. Donny flattens himself against him, pressing him against the cold stone wall. Donny's hard already, grinds his hips against Utivich. The rough material of his trousers feels like steel wool against the head of his cock, but he has to let Utivich feel it, has to let him know what he's done to Donny.

He reaches one hand under Utivich's shirt, fingers playing against the muscle of his stomach, teasing at the hair that travels up to his chest. He unbuttons Utivich's trousers, spits in his other hand, and reaches into his drawers, closes his fingers around the other man's cock like it was something he did every day. Like it was his own.

Utivich's hands come up to brace against the windowsill, his rifle laying there forgotten. He leans his head back into Donny, and for the first time Donny really sees how short he is. The back of his head fits perfectly onto Donny's shoulder.

Donny strokes his cock, matching each stroke with a thrust from his hips, grinding, the need for contact and friction outweighing the pain it causes. Utivich stands completely still, arms rigid and straining as he holds onto that windowsill with everything he's got.

"It takes some balls to question me, and question Aldo," Donny whispers. He puts his face right next to Utivich's. "What we say goes, and if we say my name is Donny, it's Donny."

"Point taken," Utivich says through gritted teeth.

Donny presses his lips to the side of Utivich's neck. He can smell the days of sweat they haven't been able to wash off yet.

"Still and all, I do like a guy with some moxie, you know? A guy who isn't afraid just because people around him are."

"Afraid? Of what?"

"You know," Donny says. He palms the head of Utivich's cock for a moment, palms it like a baseball, like he can't decide whether to just pitch it regular or try for a curveball. "Me. I know the other guys are, and that's fine. I'm pretty fucking scary. Better that they're scared of me than the Germans. I won't use their fear against them."

Utivich is close, Donny can tell, his breath hitching. Donny's other hand is still on his chest, and he can feel each shallow breath jerk underneath it. He's close, too, and lets himself go before he finishes Utivich off, stops stroking for just a second and jerks rapidly until everything stops, that exquisite moment where he forgets everything and just lets the sensation wash over him. His head is clearer then, and he resumes stroking Utivich's cock. Utivich doesn't even jerk his hips, just stands totally still, and the only indication he gives that he is coming is a strangled cry and the hot stickiness that flows over Donny's hand.

They stand there like that for a minute, like a photograph. Donny still has his fingers wrapped loosely around his cock, and Utivich still stands braced against the windowsill.

Donny takes a deep breath, takes his hands off Utivich, and reaches for the dirty gray handkerchief in his pocket. He wipes his fingers clean, gropes in his trousers and takes care of the mess in there as well.

Utivich picks up his rifle again, looks forward out of the window.

"Mordechai," Donny says.

Utivich turns around finally, looks at Donny with his eyes narrowed. "Sorry?"

"My real name. It was my grandfather's name."

"Oh," Utivich says. He looks down. "That's a good name."

"Yeah, but it ain't exactly me, is it?"

"What's in a name anyway?"

"A lot. That rose wouldn't smell as sweet if it was called a Mildred or something." Through the silvery moonlight that shines through the basement window, Donny can see a minute flicker of surprise in Utivich's face. "Yeah, I know a little about Shakespeare."

"Guess the surprises keep on coming with you, Mor—"

"Don't."

"All right."

And he never does. Never mentions it again, never tells the other guys. But other times when they fool around, Donny sees his lips pursing together to form that first moaning "M" sound, that ridiculous ancient name that Donny thinks should have passed out of fashion sometime around the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. A different time and a different place, and he might let Utivich get away with it, might even like it. But they never quite get there.


End file.
